A forum is not visible to site participants unless at least one topic is created. See Creating a topic or review the Forum Basics video.

Click the title of a Thread. When the View drop-down box is set to "Thread," you can read all the messages on the page and click "Mark All as Read" at the top of the page. Then click the "Next Thread" link to go immediately to the next thread without loading the main Forum page.

If the View drop-down box is set to View "Unread" messages, use the Previous Thread - Next Thread links at the top right to show only new messages. After reading, click the letter icon or "Mark All as Read" at the top of the page.

Alternatively, you can click the small black triangle next to the Thread title to display a threaded version of sub-posts. Click the letter icon next to the post to mark the post as "Read."

There is currently no way to do this using Sakai tools. Ask students to identify themselves within the post itself.

See Sending a message (step 3) to all users with a particular role or use P.O. Box. Note that if a student chooses to hide his identity by changing his privacy status, you will not see his name in the To: list, but he will receive your message if you send it to the Student Role.

Reordering works well using the Firefox browser. If you use Internet Explorer, use the arrows on the left to reorder resources (do not use the numbers, which is problematic).

The default view of the Schedule is by week from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. You can click the Earlier option at the top of the listings or Later option at the bottom to see other times.

See the Sakai Wiki Overview for Tips and Tricks, Wiki markup language, and other Wiki help topics.

See Deleting Pages in the Wiki tool.

Storage limits are: 200 MB per file upload and 1 GB total per site.

Using the Assignments tool, instructors have two grading options to record and post assignment grades in Sakai.

1. • Add to Gradebook lets you grade each student's work only from the Assignment tool.
2. • Associate with existing Gradebook entry lets you enter grades using either the Assignment or Gradebook tool.

See Linking an assignment to the Gradebook in Sakai@UD Help for a comparison of the two options.

When grading a student's submitted work in Assignments, an instructor can permit the student to resend a revised version.

When the student views the returned assignment, he will have the option of resending a new or edited version.

This typically is a problem when using the Mac Safari browser. See Technical Requirements for a list of supported browsers. Firefox is the UD-recommended browser.

If the file is over 200 MB, students can use UD Dropbox to submit the work directly to the instructor.

In Assignments you must return the assignment to the student in order for him or her to see it.

The default date for an individual student's Allowed Resubmission is the Accept Until date for an Assignment. In an Assignment with multiple resubmissions allowed, if the instructor changes the Accept Until date, the individual students' Allowed Resubmissions dates keep the original Accept Until date. To change an Accept Until date for an Assignment with multiple resubmissions for all students, the instructor can:

1. a. change the Number of resubmissions allowed to 0
2. b. change the Accept Until date
3. c. Post the Assignment
4. d. change the Number of resubmissions allowed to Unlimited or the number you want
5. e. Post the Assignment again

Allowing multiple resubmissions is most useful if the instructor wants the students to be able to send several versions of their work without the instructor having to intervene. With the number of resubmissions set to zero, when the instructor views a student's work he or she can still allow the student to resubmit and set the date to accept that resubmission.

An instructor can let a student resubmit his answers to a test. IIn Tests & Quizzes, click Scores on the published assessment. Then click Submission Status and Allow retake? under the student's name.

Note that after a student retakes a test, if you export the scores for the published test the file produced will contain the results of both submissions. For both the Gradebook and the Tests & Quizzes the latest score is kept.

In Tests & Quizzes, assessments are graded anonymously by default. This feature is intended to prevent grading bias based on a grader's past experience with a particular student. This setting cannot be changed in a published assessment.

Before publishing an assessment, in the Core Assessment, an instructor can click Settings then Grading to choose the option that allows student identities to be seen by graders.

No. The connection between a pending assessment and a question pool must be reset if changes are made to the pool:

1. • If you have copied an individual question, delete the question and re-add it to the assessment.
2. • If you randomly draw from a question pool in a part of an assessment, edit the part and click Save.

Remember that questions can only be edited in a pending assessment. If you need to change a question in a published assessment, first remove the published assessment, edit the pending version and republish it.

Using the Assignments tool, instructors have two grading options to record and post assignment grades in Sakai.

1. • Add to Gradebook lets you grade each student's work only from the Assignment tool.
2. • Associate with existing Gradebook entry lets you enter grades using either the Assignment or Gradebook tool.

See Linking an assignment to the Gradebook in Sakai@UD Help for a comparison of the two options.

Currently, the Gradebook does not allow you to assign extra credit, drop the lowest score, or give negative scores. For help in implementing your grading needs, request a Sakai@UD consultation.

This is under development.

Values for Gradebook items that are added in Assignments or sent from Tests & Quizzes can only be posted or edited from those tools and cannot be uploaded directly to the Gradebook.

Grades for Assignments that are "associated" with an existing Gradebook item can be uploaded. Care must be taken to make sure the Gradebook item maximum point value matches that of the Assignment.

To remove a Gradebook item sent from a Tests & Quizzes Assessment:

1. a. Edit the Published Assessment:
   
   1. 1. Select Settings.
   2. 2. In the Grading menu, change the Gradebook Options to None.
   3. 3. Click Save Settings.
2. b. Now you can remove the published assessment from Tests & Quizzes if necessary.

If you remove the published assessment before changing the Settings, you will not be able to delete its Gradebook item. If you then try to republish a graded Core Assessment with the same name, you will receive an error telling you to choose another title.

See Making grades available to students. Comments made using the Assignments tool do not appear in the Gradebook.

Instructors can assign letter grades to Assignments but they cannot be sent to the Gradebook. Only numeric values can be added to Gradebook items. In the Gradebook a letter grade can be associated with the course grade. If you want to have the students see any textual feedback you can use the Post'Em tool.

If you added an Assignment to the Gradebook, edit the point value of an Assignment using the Assignments tool.

If you choose "Edit gradebook item settings" from the Gradebook Items list, you will see a message to "Please go to Tests & Quizzes to edit these settings."

If you associated an Assignment with an existing Gradebook Item, you must edit the point value for both the Assignment and the Gradebook Item separately.

See the FAQ above "What is the connection between Assignment and the Gradebook?"

WebCT will not be available after the Spring 2010 semester, so if you start converting now, you will avoid the last minute rush. IT will provide help and training to make the conversion easier for you. Be careful not to underestimate the amount of time it will take you to convert each course.

You can easily create your first course by looking at the Basics of Sakai@UD - Courses documentation on this site or by requesting a Sakai practice course through an IT Help Request form. You might want to plan your time so that you can migrate just one course per semester.

You do not have to use Sakai. In fact, some faculty who have been building their own class web sites outside of WebCT or Sakai may choose to continue to do that. However, if you choose to use a UD-supported Learning Management System, you should be aware that the last semester WebCT will be available at UD is Spring 2010.

Yes. In fact, many faculty plan to migrate their WebCT courses to Sakai one at a time, so you can run some courses in WebCT and some in Sakai. You can even build a Sakai course and unpublish it so your students will not see it until you are ready. Just remember that Spring 2010 will be the last semester WebCT will be available for UD faculty and students.